This document summarizes the third webinar in a 12-part Transformative Classroom Management series. The webinar explored the classroom environment and social learning model. It discussed the explicit and implicit factors that make up the classroom environment, including teacher language, social frames, and how power and expectations are manifested. The webinar also covered the social learning model and how students learn indirectly through observing teacher-student interactions and peer influences. The social learning model emphasizes that teacher actions have indirect learning consequences for all students.

2. Transformative Classroom
Management
Webinar #3 of 12
Classroom Environment and Social Learning
Virginia Department of Education
Office of School Improvement

3. Transformative Classroom
Management (TCM)
Professional Development Series
1. Data shows Transformation Classroom Practices Increase Achievement
2. Moving up the Function Continuum
3. Classroom Environment and Social Learning
4. Creating Clear and Effective Classroom Expectations
5. The Technical Management of a Classroom
6. Motivating Students to Learn
7. Creating a Class Social Contract and Logical Consequences
8. Implementing a Consequence and Dealing with Power Struggles
9. Instruction – Assessment - Management Connection
10. Facilitating Effective Cooperative Learning
11. Succeeding with Challenging Students
12. Creating the 1-Style Classroom

4. Transformative Classroom
Management Series
• Series of Twelve Sessions
• Facilitator and Participant Guide
• Clips of Skills in Practice
• Other Resources
• Virginia Department of Education Web site

5. VDOE Guidelines for Uniform
Performance Standards and
Evaluation Criteria for Teachers
• Offers professional development for
Performance Standard 5: Learning
Environment

6. Purpose
The purpose of the third webinar is to:
1. Explore the factors that make up the
classroom environment and what has
been called the “hidden curriculum”
2. Gain a better understanding of the Social
Learning Model (SLM) and how it defines
how we learn indirectly

7. Presenter - John Shindler
• Dr. John Shindler is a Professor of
Education at California State University,
Los Angeles, and the Director of the
Alliance for the Study of School Climate.

8. Today’s Agenda
1. Welcome and Reflections from
Webinar two
2. Classroom environment and “hidden
curriculum.”
3. Social Learning Model
4. Reflections and Activities (See TCM
Guidebook)

9. Talk to four teachers and ask them what
they are trying to accomplish. What do
they say?
Observe their classes a few weeks in to
the year. Do their desires match the
realities in the classes?
Implicit realities are usually more
determinant than explicit wishes

10. Components Level of Awareness
Explicit •Explicit Expectations
•Rules
•Intended Curriculum
•Social Contract
Mostly Deliberate and Overt
Implicit •Teacher Language
•Social Frames
•How Power is Manifest
•Emotional Bank Account
•Indirect Learning
•Teaching “Who We Are.”
•Dramas and Games
•Implicit Rules
•Implicit Expectations
Potentially Intentional
Mostly Unconscious
Implicit vs. Explicit Levels of the
Classroom Environment

11. In a functional context these 3 frames
operate effectively. They are defined by
the behavior shown by the student and
the response shown by the teacher.
Social Frames
Deference (Student) Deportment (Teacher)
Responsible behavior More freedom, choices and
responsibility
High Level of Effort Recognition of Effort
Loyalty and Respect Respect and Caring

12.  Examine Teachers A, B and C in Exercise 3.1 in
your Guidebook. How would you characterize their
language and what effect would it have on the
climate on the class?
 I would predict that 1) all of you characterize them
about the same way and 2) your assessments were
accurate. Keep in mind how little information you
had – does that help you see the power of words?
Teacher Language

13. How would you label Teacher A’s
Language and Affect on the students?
• After handing out an assignment, “I don’t want to
see all the sloppy papers that I saw the last time.”
• “Stop talking or I will . . .”
• After a wrong answer, “No, you guys aren’t
getting this”
• Sarcastic responses on a regular basis
• “I told you guys to get to work”
• “When are we ever going to learn?”

14.  What does Power look like in the classroom?
 What does power look like as a quantity that
exists in the class, rather than a display by a
person?
 Do you see evidence of a “Paradox of Power”
(the more we give away/empower, the more
power there is)?
How is Power Manifest in your
Class?

15. • In a now famous study (Pygmalion in the
Classroom (Rosenthal and Jacobson), teachers
were told that some of their students were
“rising stars,” (but in fact they were randomly
sampled), and that these rising stars would, in
the end, outperform the other students.
• What happened at the end of the term?
• How can you explain these results?
Implicit Expectations

16. It is said that “We Teach Who We Are.”
Do you find this to be true?
Reflect on one other teacher that you have observed.
What does this look like in reference to him/her?
In the TCM book, chapters 3 and 16 ask you to reflect
upon what comes out of you unconsciously (especially
under stress) that surprises you, (parent tapes, world
view, etc.).
Teaching “Who We Are”

17. We do not learn everything directly
Social/Indirect Learning
Teacher
Other
Students
Student

18. • Principle One: The students as a collective
learn lessons indirectly from the interactions
between the teacher and particular students.
• When we interact or intervene with one student or
group of students, we have an audience eager to
learn how we operate. What we do sends a
message to the rest of the class.
Social Learning Model (SLM)
Dynamic #1

19. Dynamic Three: Peer influences. 1) For some
students peers may be a more significant source
of influence than the teacher. For many students,
impressing peers may represent a larger need than
meeting the expectations of the teacher, especially if
the student has an unmet need for love/belonging.
2) We need to encourage our popular and
influential students to support group goals. If the
strong personality students take on a sense of
entitlement, or decide to work against the goals of the
group, it will create a political problem that can have a
divisive affect.
SLM Dynamic #2

20. When would you say that it is effective to
use whole-group contingencies?
In what cases would you say that they are
ineffective or undesirable?
Use of Collective Consequence
to Modify Behavior

21. When we have a student who is more
interested in the admiration, attention and
recognition of his/her peers than that of
the teacher, it can be a challenge. But
what are some of the ways that we might
be able to obtain a win-win outcome with
this kind of student?
Use of the SLM to benefit
“Social” Students

22. Dynamic Six: Making tomorrow better as
a result of what you do today. Consider
the social learning model when taking
disciplinary action. To promote more long-
term success, before taking action, ask
yourself, “what indirect learning will result
from what I am considering?”
SLM Dynamic #5

23. Upcoming TCM Webinars
The next webinar in the series provides a set of strategies for creating clear
and internalized classroom expectations
1. Data shows Transformation Classroom Practices Increase Achievement
2. Moving up the Function Continuum
3. Classroom Environment and Social Learning
4. Creating Clear and Effective Classroom Expectations
5. The Technical Management of a Classroom
6. Motivating Students to Learn
7. Creating a Class Social Contract and Logical Consequences
8. Implementing a Consequence and Dealing with Power Struggles
9. Instruction – Assessment - Management Connection
10. Facilitating Effective Cooperative Learning
11. Succeeding with Challenging Students
12. Creating the 1-Style Classroom

24. References
• Fitzclarence, L., & Giroux, H. (1984) The Paradox of Power in Educational
Theory and Practice. Language Arts, v61 n5 p462-77
• Rosenthal & Jacobson (1968) Pygmalion in the Classroom. The Urban
Review. v.3 n.1 16-20.
• Shindler, J. (2010) Transformative Classroom Management. Jossey-Bass.
San Francisco, CA